Pender's Blog by Lee Pender, RCPU Editor

Speaking to Exchange

Speech technology has certainly been a long time coming. When
I was covering IBM in the early 1990s, I recall visiting its facility
in La Gaude, France, and being thoroughly embarrassed when they
made me talk into a microphone in order to make a camel go hip-hopping
across the desert, all in an attempt to demonstrate some fledgling
voice recognition technology. (On the other hand, I also recall
a great lunch in the company cafeteria that day. It was topped off
by a visit to the adjacent espresso room, where you drop a token
into a machine, select your own special concoction, then stand around
little tables drinking it. The French do not take their coffee lightly.)
Yesterday, Microsoft announced it will
integrate its own speech technology into a future release of Exchange
Server in an effort to deliver speech-enabled unified messaging.
That sounds like an opportunity for partners, as customers will
no doubt need help in implementing the technology.

Roadmaps and Roundtables
Microsoft had its A-list executives on hand for its annual
meeting with financial analysts last week, at which it described
its product roadmap in the broadest of terms. For partners, the
session may well have raised more questions than it answered, such
as, “What is this enterprise version of Vista all about?”
Steve Ballmer also talked about Microsoft offering more services,
such as hosted versions of CRM, Outlook and other Office applications—a
topic that typically raises partner hackles.

Microsoft posted a number of Webcasts and transcripts from the
event on its Web
site. Of particular interest to me was a discussion
with Bill Gates and CTO Ray Ozzie, moderated by Ed Lazowska, who
holds the Bill & Melinda Gates Chair in Computer Science &
Engineering at the University of Washington. Ozzie expounds on his
experience with Microsoft thus far and how his Groove technology
fits into the overall scheme of things at Microsoft. (Stay tuned
for next month’s issue of Redmond Channel Partner magazine,
by the way, in which we’ll have a story on the opportunity
the Groove technology presents for partners.)

PDC Speaker Lineup Set
You’ll have another chance to catch Bill Gates, along with
Jim Allchin, at the Professional Developers Conference coming up
Sept. 13 in Los Angeles, according to the keynote
speaker lineup Microsoft announced this week.

Betas, Betas and More Betas
Microsoft shipped
the beta version of Windows Vista last Wednesday, a full week
ahead of its promised Aug. 3 deadline, and released beta versions
of Longhorn server to testers in a private beta program. At the
same time, the company released beta 1 of IE7, the first new version
of IE since before Google mattered.

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Genuine Patch Needed
In a development that proves the program is warranted, hackers
have found a way to skirt Microsoft’s Windows Genuine Advantage,
which is intended to ensure users have a legitimate copy of Windows
before they download software updates. Genuine Advantage is a good
thing for partners that sell legitimate versions of Windows, as
it will help weed out those that don’t—assuming Microsoft
can plug holes like this one.

In the September issue of Redmond Channel Partner magazine, we’re
planning a story on the benefits of landing a Microsoft partner
award and what it takes to win. Subscribe
online to make sure you don’t miss it or any of our other
coverage.

Tip of the Week
In the two months since it was announced, the SQL Server Migration
Assistant (SSMA) for Oracle has been downloaded about 2,500 times
and reaction from early adopters of the free tool is “very
positive,” according to Madhu Reddy, a senior product manager
in the SQL Server Marketing team. SSMA reduces the manual labor
involved in a database migration roughly 60 to 80 percent by substantially
automating many of the steps involved. They include assessing the
scope of the project, which is a key one for partners because it
helps you ensure you don’t underbid the job. The tool also
helps you migrate the schema, data, business logic and stored procedures,
making the project less complex and error-prone. Microsoft has trained
more than 30 partners on how to use the tool and posted a partial
list. For more information, including customer testimonials,
go here.